Wednesday night’s nationally televised game as part of NBC Sports Network’s rivalry night was an entertaining game throughout. The Pittsburgh Penguins came into Philadelphia having owned the Flyers as of late. However, seeing as Wednesday night’s game was their last of a five-game road trip consisting of traveling much of western Canada before arriving into the City of Brotherly Love, it was obvious the Penguins didn’t have much gas left in the tank besides the play of goaltender Matt Murray.
Besides the first period, which the Penguins dominated much of, the Flyers outskated and out-chanced them the rest of the way, leaving Murray to stop countless odd-man rushes and sequences of high-scoring chances from the Flyers just to keep his team in the game.
The Flyers coming into the game were sitting seven points back of the last wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference and played desperately. That desperation along with the heavy legs of the Penguins as the game wore on gave way for the winning recipe for the Flyers. If not for Murray, the game could have been a much worse score than it turned out to be.
First Period
The Penguins would ride the initial adrenaline rush to start the game and would take it to the Flyers for much of the period. However, as the period wore on, the Flyers would begin to make their push into taking control of the game. The Penguins certainly had their chances to get an early lead and take advantage of their initial wave of momentum as the Flyers handed them a few key power play,s but ultimately they couldn’t cash in.
Late in the period, as the Flyers began to get their legs under them, the barrage of scoring chances began with ones like this below:
Matt Murray absolutely robs Brayden Schenn. pic.twitter.com/Iq8LL9GkVA
— Sons of Penn (@SonsofPenn) March 16, 2017
Second Period
The second stanza is where the Flyers took advantage of a tired Penguins team in a malaise, and did not look back. It all began with Sean Couturier, as he smashed home a good rebound opportunity to put the Flyers up 1-0.
Couturi-yay! #PITvsPHI pic.twitter.com/LabmSCJSS2
— Philadelphia Flyers (@NHLFlyers) March 16, 2017
From there the Flyers would continue to push the pace, leading the Penguins to take some minor penalties as a result, and Wayne Simmonds, in his office on the power play, put the Flyers up 2-0 and put a stranglehold on the game for the rest of the way.
🚂🚂🚂 #ChooChoo #PITvsPHI pic.twitter.com/3xu6qYUiJ6
— Philadelphia Flyers (@NHLFlyers) March 16, 2017
Third Period
With the Penguins needing to get a bounce to go their way in order to wake themselves up and get some possible momentum going in their favor, the Flyers just continued to out-man and outskate the tired legs of their counterparts. As the third period wore on, it almost looked as if Murray was being left out on an island to fend for himself. He did everything in his power to stop high-quality Flyers scoring chances to keep his team in the mix.
Murray stuffs Filppula's backhand attempt off the feed from Konecny. pic.twitter.com/59lKispzr4
— Sons of Penn (@SonsofPenn) March 16, 2017
However, the Flyers would finally cash in on Murray as they would not stop coming at him in waves, and it would be the captain Claude Giroux sealing the game and making it 3-0 for the Flyers. The Flyers would go on to score again with the game already set to take home a desperate and much-needed 4-0 shutout win over their archrival Penguins. With the win, they now sit five points out of the last wild-card in the east.
